3 Terrifying Banned Toys

It’s all fun and games, as they say, until someone loses an eye. We all want our kids to be happy, and like most parents, you’ve probably bought all kinds of fun novelties to see their little faces light up. While most toys are completely safe, there have been a few that have landed many children in the emergency room. Here are just a few of the most prolific banned toys…

As you probably know, snap bracelets are spring-loaded bands that can be straightened out and made rigid, and when they’re slapped against a wrist, they instantly curl into place. You’d think that kids would grow tired of doing this over and over after a long enough time, but this fad survived for a pretty long time over the nineties. As you may remember, it didn’t take long for the more cheaply made knock-offs of these toys to start claiming victims. When the metal bands inevitably tore through the fragile covering, they’d slice into children’s tender flesh, causing some extremely nasty cuts. After a string of personal injury cases, the cheaper knock-off versions of these toys were investigated across the US, which ended in one of the biggest toy recalls in recent history.

Aqua Dots

As any parent will know, it’s no secret that young children like to investigate all kinds of random things by putting them in their mouths. This, you’ll agree, makes non-toxicity kind of a given for any toy design. Sadly, this isn’t always the case. Various lapses in judgment have led to toys with toxic plastics and paints hitting the shelves, and one of the more recent instances of this came in the form of Aqua Dots. These were basically little plastic beads which could be arranged in patterns on a grid. Then, when they were sprayed with water, they’d “magically” stick together. This was all fine until the beads were ingested. The highly toxic chemical used to make this toy ultimately led to over four million units being recalled. Children who ingested the beads suffered from respiratory depression, seizures, or even be rendered comatose. One child even had to stay in hospital for five days. As benign as Aqua Dots look, they should have never been allowed on the shelves!

Looking at the round, rosy-cheeked face of a Cabbage Patch Kid, it’s hard to believe that these dolls could ever hurt a child. However, many parents learned the hard way that their innocent faces were a façade for something much more sinister. The “Snacktime” version of these dolls featured a motorised mouth, which allowed the doll to eat plastic foods. Kids being as curious as they are, it didn’t take long for a child to stick their finger in the mouth, and have it chewed by the doll’s unforgiving mechanical maw. This didn’t make the dolls exactly life-threatening, but they didn’t come with an “off” switch, and many parents didn’t like the idea of them staying on the shelves!